2-in-1 Yada Yada (73 page)

I
groped for the desk behind me, trying to steady myself.
Oh Jesus . . . Jesus! Help me!
Hakim and Jamal—
brothers?
But the names! Porter . . . Wilkins . . .

“You!” The woman spat again, slicing into my jumbled thoughts with her sharp, piercing eyes. Hakim's eyes pooled into confusion, swimming back and forth between us. His mother suddenly seemed to realize he was standing there and spun him around. “Go back into the hallway, Hakim!”

“But, Ma—”

“Now!”
The woman thrust her finger toward the classroom door.

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Christy quietly lead Hakim out into the hallway, easing the door shut behind her.
Oh
please, Christy, go get Avis Johnson! Hurry!

As the door closed with a soft wheeze, Geraldine Porter swung her accusing finger into my face. “What kind of diabolical joke is this?” Her fury slashed at me, like barbed wire whipping in the wind. “You . . . you kill my son! You walk away scot-free! Now here you are, acting like nothing happened, messing in my family's life, hiding behind a clever smokescreen—‘Miz B' or whatever you call yourself.” The barbs melded into a sneer.

I gulped for air. “No, no! Ms. . . . Ms. Porter, believe me! I had no idea Hakim was—”

“Well, I won't have it, do you understand me?” Geraldine Porter trampled my protest. “I . . . will . . . not . . . let . . . you . . . teach . . . my . . . son!” Each word hit me like a shotgun pellet.

Suddenly she whirled, her eyes sweeping the room. “Where's Hakim's desk?” She marched up and down the rows, glaring at the names taped carefully to each one. “Don't just stand there—show me where my son sits!”

Barely trusting my legs to hold me up, I made it to Hakim's desk then watched helplessly as she pulled out dog-eared pocket folders, pencils, a knit cap. “Ms. Porter,
please,
can we talk? Hakim is so bright, but he needs some special help. And I want to help him.” My words tumbled out, almost falling over each other in my urgency to salvage something from this disaster. “If he could be tested—”

“Tested!” She slammed the top of the desk down. “Oh, yes, I know about this
testing.
It starts now, doesn't it—tracking kids into dumb and dumber, prettying it up under fancy titles like ‘special needs.' ” She was shouting at me. “Well, get this straight, Ms. Baxter. You don't have to worry about testing Hakim, because I am going to transfer him out of this classroom! Out of this school! Jesus!” Suddenly her features crumpled and her words descended into a moan. “Jesus! How much can one person bear?”

Instinctively, I reached out to her, but she jerked back, pulling her moment of vulnerability behind her flashing eyes. She straightened, and once again I saw the woman, hardened in her grief, who had faced me down in the courtroom after the charges against me had been dropped “for lack of evidence.”

“Goodbye, Ms. Baxter. You won't—”

The door of the classroom opened. We both jumped. I caught a glimpse of royal blue as Avis Johnson came into the room and made her way quickly to where we were standing by Hakim's desk.

“Ms. Porter,” she said, her composed, authoritative voice spreading calm like foam over a wildfire. She extended her hand to Hakim's mother. “I am Avis Johnson, principal here at Bethune Elementary. I don't believe I've had the pleasure.”

The woman seemed taken off guard. “Wilkins-Porter,” she corrected. “Geraldine Wilkins-Porter.” She lifted a determined chin. “I would like to have my son transferred out of this classroom immediately.”

Oh God!
My spirit sank.
She really is going to take Hakim out.
I didn't know whether to try to explain to Avis, but by now I was fighting back tears. Did she recognize the woman? Avis had come to the hearing and sat in the back of the courtroom—to pray, she'd said. This woman had been there too. But if Avis knew what this was about, all she said now was, “Why don't we go to my office, and we can discuss it.”

Hakim's mother tossed her head. “There is nothing to discuss. Hakim will not be back in school until the necessary arrangements have been made. I will call you.” She pressed the collection of items from Hakim's desk against the front buttons of her trim, navy-blue suit and strode resolutely toward the classroom door.

Out in the hall I heard Hakim wail, “Why we goin' home, Mama?” and a sharp, “Because—that's why!” before the door closed again.

Avis and I just stared at each other. Finally, Avis broke the fragile silence. “That was . . . Jamal Wilkins's mother?”

I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. The tears I'd been fighting back slid over the edges and ran down my cheeks.

“Lord, have mercy!” Avis sucked in her breath as though gathering her wits about her. “How many more parent conferences do you have, Jodi?”

I held up two shaky fingers.

“Christy can do them—I'll sit in with her. You go to the teachers' lounge and pull yourself together. But don't leave until we talk, all right?”

I was so grateful, I wanted to throw my arms around Avis or fall down and kiss her feet. Nodding mutely, I found the box of tissues on my desk, blew my nose, and moved numbly toward the door.

HOW I MADE IT THROUGH the teeming hallway without running into a distracted parent or an open door, I'll never know. Mercifully, the teachers' lounge was empty, and I collapsed on the lone, saggy couch just as the dam of frustration and humiliation burst in a flood of tears.
Oh God, Oh God, Oh God, Oh God . . .
For some reason my desperate prayer got no further, and I let the silent sobs take over till they shook my whole body.

Finally I mopped my face, blew my nose, and tried to corral my wildly bucking thoughts.
What did she mean, ‘hiding behind a
smokescreen'? I'd only signed that note ‘Ms. B' because that's what
Hakim called me. My full name had been on room assignments mailed
to each student's family, hadn't it? Surely she remembered my name
from the hearing—probably kept it pinned to her wall and threw darts
at it. Hadn't I tried to reach out to her that day, tell her how terribly
sorry I was?
The helpless feeling washed over me once more.
Oh
God, what more can I do?
I'd give anything if I could change what happened that dreadful day! But—

“But you can't, can you?”
That's what Jamal Wilkins's mother had said to me after the hearing.

I felt cornered. What good was God's forgiveness if the person most affected by the accident that snuffed the life from her son wouldn't—couldn't—forgive me?

The door to the lounge opened and shut. I barely looked up but saw Avis's blue suit move toward me. I knew my eyes were puffy, my mascara probably smudged, my skin red and blotchy. I didn't care. Avis had seen me worse in the hospital.

Bethune Elementary's principal sat down beside me on the couch; I caught a whiff of silky perfume. Avis's presence, her smell, her voice usually filled me with a quiet joy, as though the Spirit of God within her filled the space wherever she went. Today, the sweet scent seemed dissonant, like rose petals wafting through a garbage-strewn alley.
Ha!
Even Avis couldn't fix
this
mess. How many other parents and teachers had heard Hakim's mother yelling at me? What were they thinking right now? Would this cause a scandal for Bethune Elementary?

Geraldine Wilkins-Porter was right about one thing: it was some kind of sick joke.

I started to laugh—harsh, unhappy laughter. My shoulders shook again, and I threw my head back against the couch and howled.

“Jodi, stop.”

I couldn't.
Jamal Wilkins . . . Hakim Porter—who could've
known? I killed one. I was teaching the other.
It was hysterical when you thought about it. I shrieked. I let it all come out. I didn't care who heard me.

“Stop.”

I stopped. It was the slap that did it. Avis Johnson slapped me.

“avis . . . slapped you?” Denny drew back and stared at me as I told him the whole sordid story an hour later.

I nodded sheepishly. “I know what you're thinking.
Very
unprofessional. Except we weren't ‘Ms. Johnson' and ‘Ms. Baxter' at that moment—just Avis and Jodi. I deserved it, I'm afraid. I was getting out of control.”

When I'd finally gotten home from school about nine o'clock, I pulled Denny away from
Law and Order
on TV—high-school conferences had been the previous week—and said I really, really needed to talk. Now we were sitting on our bed, backs propped against as many pillows as I could find, door shut against all intruders—except Willie Wonka, that is, who scratched and whined at the door till we let him in. Now the chocolate Lab sat with his white-whiskered chin resting on the side of the bed, brow wrinkled like tire treads, knowing in that peculiar way of dogs that something was wrong.

“Frankly, I'm mad, Denny—
really
mad at God, because I
prayed
about these conferences, prayed for all my students, and . . . and I feel
tricked.
How could God let this happen?” Avis had just listened to me rant and cry for a while, and so did Denny. I finally blew my nose. “Then she hugged me and said we'd talk later and sort it out somehow. And she promised to call Hakim's mother” —
Jamal's mother!
a voice in my head accused—“to talk about the situation.”

Denny nodded. “You've got to let Avis handle it, Jodi. It's out of your hands. There's nothing you can do.”

He reached out and pulled me against him, and I tried to relax in the curve of his arm, but my emotions still bounced around like ping-pong balls. Was that true? It was out of my hands? There was nothing I could do?

Denny's just trying to comfort you, Jodi, trying to help you let go.

But, my mind argued, hadn't I started something with Hakim? Something good? Why wouldn't God let me finish what I'd started? Hadn't I been learning about His grace? Even my name:
God is
gracious.
Yet maybe grace wasn't enough—

“—not if she won't forgive me!” My loud voice in the dark quiet startled me.
Good grief, I said that aloud.

Then I heard Denny's whisper muffled against my hair: “Yeah. Goes for me too.”

37

I
had the nightmare again during the night, except the face lit up in my headlights kept shifting:
Jamal's eyes,
wide with sudden terror . . . Geraldine Wilkins's face, an ice
sculpture of fierce anger . . . then Hakim, looking straight at me,
betrayed, accusing.
I made myself wake up and go to the bathroom, even chugged a whole glass of water. Yet the moment I laid down again, the three faces recycled behind my closed eyelids like a PowerPoint loop.

I was exhausted when the alarm went off. Still, I put my body on autopilot, let Willie Wonka outside, started the coffee . . . and suddenly realized what Denny had meant last night when he said,
“Yeah. Goes for me too.”
He meant MaDear and Adele. The three of them, trapped in a tragic dance. Forgiveness would be so freeing, but . . . whom to forgive?

When I got to school, the halls were empty. Good. I'd deliberately left home twenty minutes early so I wouldn't run into any of the other teachers and have to explain what happened last night. I collapsed at my desk and tried to pray, but all I could do was mumble over and over, “Oh God, help. Please help me—”

“Jodi?”

Startled, I looked up at Avis's voice. I hadn't heard the door open. The royal-blue suit had given way to a casual pair of black slacks and mocha sweater set. She pulled up a chair beside my desk. “Good. I'm glad you came early. I wanted to talk to you a minute before the school day started.”

I just looked at her, too worn-out to use up extra words.

“You said last night that you're mad at God,” she began. I didn't need reminding. I was still mad. “But can you handle the truth, Jodi? God has promised that He is working
all
things together for the good of those who love Him, who are called according to His purpose.
His
purpose, Jodi. His purpose for
you.”

I recognized the scripture she was quoting: Romans 8:28.
Oh
sure.
One of the bedrock verses I'd memorized as a kid, convenient to haul out whenever anything went south. But I wasn't sure I really believed it at that moment.

Avis rested a hand on mine, which were clenched together in front of me on the desk. “Be encouraged, Jodi. I know it's hard to see right now, but if you have a minute before the kids come in, read Isaiah 55.” She stood to go then turned back at the door and smiled. “Frankly, I think God is doing something big—very big.”

She was gone, although I could still feel the touch of her hand on mine. I didn't move for a few moments, thinking about what she'd said. Then I glanced at the clock—five minutes till the bell rang. Christy would be here any moment. Curious, I dug into my tote bag and pulled out the small Bible I'd started to carry around, even at school, and flipped pages until I found Isaiah 55.

I skimmed the passage and landed on verse eight.
“‘For my
thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,'
declares the Lord . . .”
I almost snorted.
Guess not! Wouldn't mind if
God checked with me before putting me through a meat grinder,
though.
I kept reading.
“So is my word that goes out from my mouth:
It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and
achieve the purpose for which I sent it.' ”

Hmm.
That's what Avis just said—that God was going to accomplish
His
purpose. It'd sure be nice if He gave me a clue now and then what that was.